After Four Straight Days Of Playing The Winterland Gigs. With All And Everybody In The Band, Sound Crew,Film Crew And Extended Family Apparently Dosed On Increasing Quantities Of High Quality Acid. The Sound Both In Playing, Mixing And Ultimately The Sound Quality Of The Recording Suffered A Little From The Burn Out That Comes With That Kind Of Schedule And Consumption. The Band Sounded A Little Slower. The Sound Quality A Little Less Sharp. As Many Of Us Know This Comes With The Territory. Probably The Reason That They Took A Day Off In Between In Later Endeavors. Like The "From Egypt With Love" Shows And Some Of The New Years Runs. That Being Said Everyone Involved Did Pretty Well Considering. Several Special Moments Made Even Better With The Thought That This Might Be The Last.

More of a big party than a technically-great performance (the first half of the run is better), but you can't beat the set list - the show lasted 6 hours (with set breaks and Seastones) and featured almost everything they played in '74. Billy writes in his book that "the thinking was that if this really was the last Grateful Dead concert, Mickey should participate. I was NOT cool with that. At all. I enjoyed being the only drummer and I didn’t want that to change. I got territorial about it. Mickey didn’t know the new material and we hadn’t rehearsed or played with him in years, so I didn’t think it could be any good — and it wasn’t, that night." I don't agree that it wasn't any good - though it's just an average '74 show. I'd say "more fun to be there than to listen back today" but not with all the attendees complaining about severe heat discomfort. Like all of '74 there are strong highlights, though the actual closing of Winterland ('78) is a better run than the faux-closing.

First Set. Playing his Rhodes for this show, Keith pwns the Cold Rain & Snow, which is the version on Steal Your Face. Things go awry on a sloppy Mama Tried through Beat it on Down the Line-5, not improving until halfway through Tennessee Jed (supposedly the whole place was very gilled). Jer perks up and the crowd responds. The first song not meh for '74 is El Paso, in a somewhat hard rock version, but the momentum is lost with a stinker of a Brokedown. Turning everything around, the band spits out a concentrated China>Rider. The 17th has the best of the run but this one has Jer doing little half-step walk-ups. The last one until the NYE run '77 (it was teased a few times in '76), it has the final Feelin' Groovy segue. The Rider is slightly down-tempo but by-the-gods is Keith is good here and Jer inverts some of his standby fingerings. The set has its own encore in a little-too-practiced sounding Around & Around, the version familiar from the unfairly maligned SYF. They have all mentioned being a little too weirded out this night - which was one of the reasons for wanting to play the Great American show during the hiatus of '75.

Second Set. The entire set is on Movie Soundtrack and is known for Mickey showing up with his drum kit (after having left the band in Portchester in '71). Problem is, he hadn't practiced with them and the result is shoes-in-the-dryer. The set's a giant Playin' sandwich but it's average fare except for a perfect Wharf Rat.

Third Set (not counting Seastones). Things motor along in typical '74 fashion though Stella is notable (it's on SYF). After that the drummers are out of sync. The Johnnny B Goode is on Movie but part of the first solo is edited and the entire second solo is removed! The Half-step is the money shot where it all comes together. By the time they sobered they were probably too tired. Shit, they played almost the entire '74 catalog. One of those shows that was probably more fun to attend, than in posterity in your bedsit. Not bad, but not tops for '74.

1st Set:  C+
2nd Set: C+
3rd Set:  C
Overall = 3 Stars

Highlights:
China>Rider - final Feelin' Groovy and intricate steps
Around & Around - they're a rock band
Wharf Rat - close to perfect version
Mississippi Half-Step - falls together

Run:
10/16 - B-
10/17 - B
10/18 - B-
10/19 - C+

SOURCES: The alligator.GEMS sounds best to me. The Finney SBD runs too fast in several places and others are too slow/muddy. There's a cut in all sources of Must Have Been Roses which the Finney smooths (the one on SYF uses the 17th instead). The third set is usually on youtube. Four tracks are on Steal Your Face and 9½ are on Movie Soundtrack. SYF is far from a best-of-'74 but, though jamless, not bad either, and contained quintessential versions (albeit by default) with which we grew up.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: the second set here is the last truly awesome set every played by the non-self reverential Grateful Dead. If you can't get your rocks off on this, then you need to reconsider your decision to stop taking Vitamin A.

Beyond dispute, the second set is the last set the band ever played where it's abundantly clear that the music is playing the band and, in a non-programmed fashion, it's taking them to some very strange places and also some very awesome places. Terrifying and sublime. Turn it up fucking loud and commit yourself for 50 minutes. You won't regret it.

Love this show and the sound. Catching up on a lot of shows I just haven't had time to focus on the rest of my life.
I do find it amusing that Bobby sings "Gen-e-see, Gen-e-see" at one point during Jed. Think he was thirsty for a beer ?

The Grateful Dead, soaring transcendingly!... And all I could do was dance! There is an eloquence Jerry speaks with, just watch him play... his fingers crafting so delicately a sound you can truly only feel. Sound brings it to you. But luckily when they said We'll see you later" they were right, because each member crafted so well their sound that harmoniously it achieved unison with all other memebers. You could only watch, only dance... only be beyond yourself in every aspect of individualism that you lack experience and transcendentally arise to a state of pure ectasy within the sound that at its end you are left with a higher awareness of all that is beauty and truth. The songs achieve many eloquent beautiful... but its the sound within them that achieves truest an eloquence and beauty

What he said. I mean, can we not at least get a SBD of the only Cold Rain and Snow from '74!?! Havent listened to much of this show. But the CRS is solid for being dusty. Unfortunately the bass drum is way too loud. I wonder if the SBD has this problem?

A real shame that this whole run of shows has been taken down. I understand we have hundreds of other shows to listen to, but perhaps someone, someday, might consider either releasing a boxset of the whole October Winterland shows from '74 or put these shows back up for streaming.

MM GOOD!! THATS WHAT 74" DEAD IS MM GOOD!! :)

I'm glad to see that this is listenable and NOT a commercially released show like the other recording they have posted here. This sounds pretty damn good if you ask me. Thank you Archive.